"Homosexuality is not purely genetic. Environmental factors play a role. There is not a single master gene that makes people gay. I don't think that we will ever be able to predict who will be gay."

2.) Dr. Dean Hamer was asked by Scientific American if homosexuality was rooted solely in biology. He replied:

"Absolutely not. From twin studies we already know that half or more of the variability in sexual orientation is not inherited. Our studies try to pinpoint the genetic factors, not negate the psychosocial factors."

3.) British researchers generated comparable results in an identical-twin study. Their conclusion? The suprisingly low odds that both twins were homosexual.

The study by them: "confirmed that genetic factors are insufficient explanation for the development of sexual orientation."

(King, M and McDonald, E. Homosexuals Who Are Twins: A Study of 46 Probands. British Journal of Psychiatry. 160: 407-409 (1992).

4a.)Homosexual researcher Simon Levay, who studied the hypothalamic differences between the brains of heterosexuals and homosexuals:

"I didn't show that gay men are born that way the msot common mistake people make in interpreting my work. Nor did I locate a gay center in the brain."

4b.)Dr. Simon Levay: The most widely held opinion [on causation of homosexuality] is that multiple factors play a role.

Levay, Simon (1996). Queer Science, MIT Press.

5.) Dr. J. Satinover:

"Research studies on homosexuality by Dr's Dean Hamer, Michael Bailey, Richard Dillard, Simon Levay. Laura Allen and Roger Gorski have failed to show proof of a gay gene. There is no scientific evidence that shows that homosexuality is genetic. The media has sensationalized and perpetuated the myth of a homosexual gene."

"I know of no one in the field who argues that homosexuality can be explained without reference to environmental factors."

(Goldberg, Steven (1994) When Wish Replaces Thought: Why So Much of What You Believe is False. Buffalo, New York: Prometheus Books.

10a.) Science, 1994:

"Time and time again, scientists have claimed that particular genes or chromosomal regions are associated with behavioral traits only to withdraw their findings when they were not replicated. "Unfortunately," says Yale's [Dr. Joel] Gelernter: "It's hard to come up with many findings linking specific genes to complex human behaviors that have been replicated...all were announced with great fanfare, all were greeted unskeptically in the popular press; all are now in disrepute."

"While the authors interpreted their findings as evidence for a genetic basis for homosexuality, we think that the data, in fact, provide strong evidence for the influence of the environment."

(Billings, P. and Beckwith, J. Technology Review, July 1993. p.60)

12.) P. Scott Richards:

"Some environmental and psychological factors that may play a causal role in the development of homosexuality include: (1) cross-gender effiminate behavior in childhood. (2) gender-identity deficits (3) hostile, dteached or absent fathers (which leads to "defensive detachment" from the father and other males) and (4) overly close, controlling or dominating mothers.

"It provides a legal argument that is, at the moment actually having some sawy in court. For me, it's a very shaky palce. It's bad science and bad politics. It seems to me that the way we consider homosexuality in our culture is an ethical and a moral one."

14.) Camille Paglia, lesbiam activist: "Homosexuality is 'not normal'. On the contrary it is a challenge to the norm. Nature exists whether academics like it or not. And in nature, procreation is the single, relentless rule. That is the norm. Our sexual bodies were designed for reproduction. No one is born gay. The idea is ridiculous. Homosexuality is an adaptation, not an inborn trait."

Camille Paglia: " Is the gay identity so fragile that it cannot bear the thought that some people may not wish to be gay? Sexuality is highly fluid, and reversals are theoretically possible. However, habit is highly refractory, and once the sensory pathways have been blazed -- a phenmenon obvious in the struggle with obesity, smoking, alcoholism or drug addiction...helping to learn how to function heterosexually, if they wish, is a perferctly worthy aim."

Camille Paglia: " We should be honest enough to consider whether homosexuality may not indeed be a pausing at the prepubscent stage where children anxiously band together bt gender...current gay cant insists that homosexuality is 'not a choice'; that no one would choose to be gay in a homophobic society. But there is an element of choice in all behavior, sexual or otherwise. It takes an effort to deal with the opposite sex; it is safer to deal with your own kind. The issue is one of challenge versus comfort."

Boys victimized by older men are far more likely to be homosexual as adults, and the cycle often repeats itself. More environmental factors.

15.) Noted child sex-abuse expert David Finkelhor found that "boys victimized by older men were over four times more likley to be currently engaged in homosexual activity than were non-victims. The finding applied to nearly half the boys who had such an experience. Further, the adolescents themselves often linked their homosexuality to their victimization experiences."

It may not be a genetic thing yet still be at least partially biological in origin. There's been some studies that show that various hormone levels in the mother may have something to do with it. I think the most recent one was something with thyroid hormones, can't quite remember.

Good work. It seems the genetic predisposition of homsexuality is comparable to the predisposition to addictive behavioral tendencies:

For instance, certain ethnic groups appear to have a greater predisposition to alcoholism. This doesn't mean that being born Irish makes one an alcoholic, or excuses alcholism. The way many in AA put heredity and alcholism is like this: Dysfunctional upbringing (i.e., the environment) causes dysfuntional emotional states and poor copign skills, which in turn causes tendencies towards addictive behaviors. If a person has a genetic predisposition towards alcoholism and drinks heavily, that addictive tendency will be expressed through alcholism.

I've heard friends and associates discuss their upbringing, heard mandatory "sexual identity" discussions in college, and read numerous articles. Of dozens and dozens of people describing how they first realized they were homosexual, ALL involved sexual experiences which I would categorize as abusive and severely damaging if they were heterosexual. (example: A journalist wrote, "I discovered my true secuality through an experience that was at first horrifying, then liberating, which occurred in a public mens room when I was eight years old.")

I believe most homosexuality is a coping mechanism that is a response to severely dysfunctional situations. The normalization of homosexuality probably only lowers the threshold of adopting homosexual tendencies as a response.

Sorry but I don't believe that homosexuality exists at all - it's just a name that the proponents of a particular activity (or classification of activities) have given to try to legitimize it. The trick to doing that is to make it seem that there is a whole group of like-minded people who have the same innate characteristic - in fact, born that way and hence it is justified. I think that there is only an inherent sexual drive that we are all born with - and the classification isn't between heterosexual and homosexual, it's between normal and perverted - and it isn't about 'who one is', it's about 'what one does'. In the above article, Paglia is probably closest to the truth when it comes to how homosexuality is defined.

I agree that it most likely has little or nothing to do with genetics, but I also doubt that many of them have much of a choice in it. There are a great many homosexuals who desperately want not to be gay and even go so far as to marry and have families in an effort to be straight. If it were just a choice these men could make then they definately would not be gay.

id say it's mostly genetic. I mean you can find tons of animals that exhibit in same-sex behavior. Were they brought up gay or molested as a child? I mean come on. You think a lot of people want to be gay? I doubt it. It is just the way it is.

Disclaimer:
Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual
posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its
management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the
exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.